CHAPTER VII

RENÉE'S EXPERIENCE IN STORM AND SUNSHINE

The next afternoon about three o'clock, Payot called at the house of Villebois, to see his daughter.

"Well, my child, have you made up your mind yet?"

"Yes, father, I have."

"Ah! that's a good girl. I knew you would respect your old father's wishes, and take a reasonable view of the matter. A little reflection and a little reasoning was doubtless necessary to show that it was the only sensible thing you could do. Now you see that nothing could further your interests better, and you will always have the satisfaction of knowing that you were the means of binding our two families together by marrying Pierre, eh Renée?" and he patted her on the head.

"Oh, father," she faltered, "I never meant that. You misunderstand me. I loathe Pierre. How can you ask me to marry such a brute?"

"What? You dare to tell me that you won't marry the son of my old comrade-in-arms?" shrieked Payot. "You obstinate hussy, you vile wretch, you bastard, I disown you," he cried in his fury, not thinking that his words affected himself as well as her. "I shall cut you out of my will entirely--at least," he added, "not a penny beyond what the law compels me to leave you. Don't expect anything from me when you marry that pauper, that madman Delapine. You may go begging in the streets for all I care. Go away and be damned to you, with your father's curses on your head--you, you ... I don't know what to call you, you child of an abandoned woman."

The poor girl buried her face in her hands and sobbed convulsively.

"Oh, father, father, don't say such dreadful things, you are too cruel to me. Why do you treat me in this way? Why do you speak evil of my darling mother who is in the grave? Is it because I refuse to marry a man I detest?"

Payot worked himself into a terrible rage, and Renée's sobs only added fuel to the flames.

"Get out of my presence this instant, and never come near my house again. Do you hear what I say?" he added as Renée made no attempt to move. "If ever you dare to speak to me again I shall hand you over to the police," he shouted, not knowing what he was saying. "Go," he said in a voice husky and almost incoherent with rage, and rushing at her, shook her violently, and struck her across the face with his fist.

The girl fell on to the ground moaning, and then swooned away. Payot tried to raise her and wake her up, but she never moved, and at length he became really frightened and rang the bell violently.

"François," he said, trying hard to control his passion and appear calm, "my daughter has fainted, I think it must be the heat. Run and bring me a glass of cognac."

The butler returned with the brandy, which her father tried in vain to make her swallow.

"Come now, come now, don't pretend in this way. You needn't try to make me believe that you are hurt. Wake up at once, Renée, and take this brandy. Do you hear me? Now then, you little fool, don't sham any more," and so saying he tried to force the liquid down her throat by main force.

Renée, nearly choked by the fluid going down the wrong way, set up so violent a fit of spasmodic coughing that he had to get François to help him bring her round.

"I think we had better carry her up to her room, and lay her on her bed. The heat has evidently been too much for her," he said to the butler. "Go and tell her maid to come and look after her."

Having once more assured himself that she had only fainted, he gave the necessary instructions to the maid, and left the house. Stepping into his carriage he drove home. "I am afraid I must have lost my temper a bit," he said to himself, feeling now that he had calmed down, a tinge of remorse for his brutal conduct. "Well, it was entirely her fault," he exclaimed. "The obstinacy of that girl after all I have done for her is perfectly inconceivable," and consoling himself with his magnanimity, he walked up the steps of his house.

Renée, exhausted with weeping, opened her eyes, and sipped the brandy which her maid had brought her.

"My poor darling, what have they been doing to her!" she exclaimed.

"Please leave me," she said in a scarcely audible voice, "and don't allow anyone to see me on any pretence whatever, do you understand? Now pull down the blinds, and leave me alone."

As soon as Marie had gone, Renée rolled over on her face, covering it with her hands, and burst out into an uncontrollable fit of weeping.

Dinner was announced, but the young lady did not appear.

"I must go and see what is the matter," said Madame Villebois, as she hurried upstairs to Renée's room. She found the door locked. "What is the meaning of this?" she asked Marie.

"Please, madame, my mistress has a dreadful headache, and has given orders that no one is to be allowed to see her."

Madame ran down to her husband with a terrible story that she was dying, and advised a consultation of eminent specialists, and suggested bursting the door open.

"Leave her alone, my dear. Something has evidently upset her, she will have brain fever if you go and frighten her like that."

"You're a cruel, ungrateful man, Adolphe, that's the plain truth. I never heard of anyone with so little feeling as you show, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. To think of the poor lamb being neglected in this way. I call it perfectly disgraceful. You men are all a set of heartless creatures."

"Tut, tut, my dear. Let her have a good cry, there's nothing like it. She will soon get over it, and to-morrow she will be all right," and taking his wife by the arm, he led her off to dinner.

Renée woke up in the morning with a splitting headache, but feeling better towards evening, she rose and dressed, and after removing the traces of her crying, walked downstairs into the parlour.

The room was empty, and going to the piano the girl sat down in a dazed condition and attempted to play. But her heart was too sad, and Renée mechanically passed her hands over the keys, hardly conscious of what she was playing.

Renée was about to close the lid of the instrument, when she became aware of someone near her, and looking round saw Delapine who had just returned from the university, and had silently entered the room for his evening cup of coffee.

"Is that you, Henri?" she called out as she rose from the music stool and caught hold of him convulsively by the arms.

"My dear child, whatever is the matter with you? You have been crying. Come and sit down, my poor little Renée, and let me comfort you."

"Oh, Henri," she cried, "do please help me. Father came to see me yesterday, and tried all he could to make me promise to marry Pierre, and I flatly refused to have anything to do with him, and so he swore at me and vowed he would cut me off with a shilling, and turn me into the streets. I did not mind that so much, but when he told me my darling mother was an abandoned woman, which you know is a lie, and then struck me across the face, and bade me never see him again, I broke down, and I think I must have swooned away, because I didn't remember anything until I found myself on my bed. And now I am all alone in the world, and I have no one to go to in my trouble. Oh, why did my poor mother die so soon? You don't know what she was to me, Henri," and she sobbed as if her heart would break.

"Renée dear, may I be your protector? Come to me and I will never leave you. God knows I love you better than my own life. Yes, a thousand times better. Will you share your lot with me, darling? I am not rich, but all that I have is yours, and what I have not shall be made up for by my love and devotion."

Her heart was too full to reply. She just nestled in his arms, and their lips met in one lingering delicious kiss of ecstasy.

"God bless you, my own petite Renée," he answered, "I have given you my soul, dear, and in giving you that I have given you everything."

She fell into a reverie of keen delight, so keen that she felt herself becoming overwhelmed with the intoxication of love's young dream, and with a great effort she woke up to the realities of life.

"But how did you contrive to come here so early? You don't generally manage to do so."

"Well, to tell the truth, I knew everything that had happened, and so I hurried away from my laboratory in a fiacre, so as to be ready to help you the moment you dressed and came downstairs."

"Do you mean to say that you knew that father had been storming at me and hit me?"

"Yes, dear. I don't know everything, but I knew that, and I arrived here just as you entered this room, and the moment you sat down to the piano I stole in on tip-toe, and stood behind you."

Renée opened her large eyes with mingled astonishment and awe, and paused in thought.

"Will you always love me, Henri? Even when I am old and wrinkled?" she suddenly exclaimed, as if the thought of possessing him was too good to be true.

"To the eyes of real love, dear, the loved one never becomes old or wrinkled," he replied gravely.

"But will you love me very much?"

"That depends on you as well, Renée," said the professor, amused at her question. "Don't you know that Italian saying which I think is attributed to Goldoni, 'Amor solo d'amor si pasce,' 'Love feeds on love and increases by exchange'? However, let us be happy for this one short hour at any rate," he added slowly with a sigh.

"Why do you sigh?" she asked, looking alarmed.

"Have you then so soon forgotten what I told you?"

Of course she remembered the words. But what did they mean?

"I cannot tell you now," he replied, "but, dear one, you know that I have opened up my soul to you, so that you might be able to understand me."

"I do understand you, Henri, you know I do."

"Then you will trust me, won't you?"

Renée merely squeezed his hand, and looked into his eyes with a smile.

"Of course I will," she added, as a slight cloud passed over Delapine's brow. "But does it mean that we shall be separated again?" she enquired after a long pause.

"Yes, Renée, for some little time to come. But take courage, ma chérie, as I told you before it will all come right. And now, dear, the coffee is coming, and I hear Dr. Villebois in the hall."

Renée rushed back to the piano and began turning over her music, while the professor sank demurely into an armchair, and was apparently deeply engaged in reading the _Petit Journal_ upside down when Villebois walked into the room.

"Well, Delapine, mon brave, how is it that you are here so early?"

"As a matter of fact I had some very important business to attend to here, and so I came a little earlier than I intended."

"I hope the business proved satisfactory?"

"Very much so indeed," replied Delapine, looking slyly at Renée, who blushed like a peony up to the roots of her hair.

"Ha, ha! I see, I see," said Villebois, slyly shaking his finger at them both. "Splendid, splendid," he cried. "Take care of her, Delapine, my boy, you have won the greatest treasure in all France. And you, my dear, have got a man who has not his equal anywhere. He is something more than a man, he is a hero, Renée. Mark my words, before we are two years older he will be the greatest savant in Europe. Give me your hands, both of you, and let me be the first to join them together. 'Pon my word, I think I am as pleased as either of you. But, not a word, not a word, eh, professor?"

"Thank you ever so much for your congratulations, doctor, and also for your hint of caution; were things otherwise, we should ask you to tell all the world, but under the circumstances it is better we should keep it strictly to ourselves. I have good reasons for believing that more than one person is anxious to separate us, and would do anything to get us out of the way."

"Do you really mean it, professor? I can't imagine that anyone would wish you evil. Surely you don't mean to say that you have enemies who come to my house?"

"It is not my habit to mention names, my dear doctor, but I assure you, you have a Judas among your disciples. Nay, you have two or three who would be delighted to see me dead."

"Come, my dear professor, you don't really mean that. You must be joking. Take the people who were at the dinner the other evening, Riche, Marcel, the Duvals, father and son. Surely they are all your friends and strictly honourable."

"Oh, yes! Brutus is an honourable man, so are they all, all honourable men," said Delapine, imitating the mocking sarcasm of Mark Antony.

"Are you not sarcastic, professor, or do you mean it?"

"Yes, doctor," Renée interposed, "Henri is right and he means it. Oh, I know it so well," she replied bitterly.

Henri squeezed her hand while she clung close to him for protection.

"As far as I am concerned I am not in the least alarmed," said Delapine, "but it is my duty now to defend Renée. I am, as you know, a man of peace, but I shall be sorry for the man who attempts any tricks on Renée, as he will find out to his cost. You know it is written, 'Be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves,' but, ma foi, if anyone comes fooling around to hurt my dove, I have a right to set my serpent at him. Eh, doctor?"

"Ha, ha! capital, capital, those are my sentiments to a 'T'," said Villebois laughing. "But the situation is becoming serious and I promise to help you to the best of my power."

"I know you will, doctor," said Delapine, shaking him cordially by the hand. "But promise me you will not let anyone know what I suspect. Please do me the favour to invite the same guests as you had last time, together with any others you may choose to ask, for we must on no account let anyone imagine we are suspicious."

"I promise faithfully to do as you wish," said Villebois, pressing his hand.

"But you will give us the promised séance at our next party?"

"Certainly, why not?"

Madame Villebois and Céleste entered the room at this moment and the conversation ceased.